The Scepter's Return (48 page)

“My curse shall fall all the more heavily upon you and your miserable joke of a kingdom, all built of mud and straw and sticks.” The Banished One sounded ready to explode with fury. How long had it been since anyone had the nerve to twit him? Since he was cast out of the heavens? Lanius wouldn't have been surprised.

Somehow, the exiled god didn't leave the king quite as terrified as usual. Or maybe Lanius realized, even in a dream, that having the Banished One angry at him was liable to be better than having him angry at Grus. All Lanius' mental faculties were intact, as they always were in dreams the Banished One sent. That usually made those dreams worse for him. Here, now, he turned it to his advantage. “I know why they sent you down to earth,” the king said.

“Do
you?” The Banished One seemed to lean toward him. Even if Lanius was less frightened now than he had been in some other dreams, that alarmed him. In a deadly voice, the Banished One asked, “Why?”

“Because you're a bore,” Lanius' dream-self said.

The Banished One's roar of fury was so enormous, Lanius thought for a moment that it was a real sound, not an imaginary one. He burst from sleep as though shot from a stone-thrower, the way he'd gotten used to doing when escaping one of the exiled god's dreams. Sweat ran down his face and trickled along his sides from his armpits. His heart drummed madly.

“What's the matter?” Sosia asked, sleep blurring her voice.

“Bad dream.” Lanius' answer, as usual, was true but inadequate.

“You've had a lot of those lately.” His wife sounded as sympathetic as she could around a yawn.

“Maybe I have.” Lanius knew he had. The Banished One sensed he was doing something out of the ordinary, and tormented him because of it. So far, the Banished One hadn't worked out what the king had in mind. More than anything else, Lanius wanted that very partial ignorance to go on.

Sosia patted the pillow. “Well, go back to bed.” She yawned again.

“Later, maybe.” As usual after one of these jolts, Lanius was too excited to sleep. He got up and started for the door. He'd put a hand on the latch before noticing he was naked.
That
would have given any servants going through the palace corridors in the middle of the night something to talk about.

He slipped on the lightest, plainest robe he had, one made of a blend of silk and linen. No one would expect him to wear a heavy robe of state at whatever hour this was. He opened the door, slipped out, and closed it behind him as quietly as he could.

The palace was dim and quiet. Only a few torches were lit, which saved fuel. A little moth fluttered around one of the ones that still flickered. It would be sorry if it flew into the flame.

And what about me?
he wondered.
Am I flying into the flame when I go against the Banished One?
Many before him had burned themselves up. He didn't think he would. But how many of the others had thought so? Hadn't they been sure they were doing something wonderful, something that would make Avornans remember their names until the end of time? Of course they had. The only trouble was, they'd been wrong. He had to hope he wasn't.

Someone came around the corner. It was Ortalis. He seemed as surprised to see Lanius as Lanius was to see him. “Oh, hello,” Grus' son said. “What are you doing up at this time of night?”

“I might ask you the same question,” Lanius said. “As for me, I had a dream that woke me.” That would do. He didn't want or intend to go into details.

One of Ortalis' eyebrows lifted in surprise. “Did you? As a matter of fact, so did I.”

“Really?” Lanius was not only surprised but also frightened. A dream bad enough to get Ortalis out of bed was likely to come from the Banished One. Why would the exiled god want to send Ortalis dreams? For no good reason—Lanius would have staked his life on that. Cautiously, he asked, “Was the nightmare very bad?”

“Nightmare?” Ortalis gaped at him as though he'd suddenly started babbling in Thervingian. “Nightmare?” he repeated; he might not have believed his ears. “This was the most wonderful dream I ever had in my life.”

“Was it?” Lanius said, surprised all over again.

“It certainly was!” Ortalis had never spoken of anything, even hunting, with such enthusiasm before. Lanius laughed at himself. He'd jumped to a good many wrong conclusions. This looked to be one of the wrongest.
Well, good,
he thought.

“Here you are, Your Majesty.” A weary-sounding courier handed Grus a message tube.

“Thanks,” the king said, and then, sympathetically, “Have any trouble coming down here?”

“Did I ever!” The courier got livelier remembering. “This bunch of nomads started chasing me, and I was afraid they'd catch me before I could get to our next little fort. But then this
other
bunch of Menteshe came out from the side, and I really thought I was a goner. Instead of going after me, though, they pitched into each other, and I got away.”

“Good for you!” Grus said. “Nice to know the civil war between Korkut and Sanjar is still going on.”

Knowing that was especially nice after Bori-Bars had led the army of both princes' backers against the Avornans. Maybe the Banished One didn't bother uniting the Menteshe unless something more important than one courier was at stake. Or maybe Sanjar's shamans really had worked out a way to keep him from doing that. Grus hoped so.

“I had bad dreams all the way down, too,” the courier said. “But the gods in the heavens watched over me and kept me safe.”

“No doubt,” Grus said, doubting. How often did the gods in the heavens pay any attention to what went on down here in the material world? Not often enough. But, even if Grus had trouble staying confident in them, he didn't want to damage the other man's faith, so he let it go at that.

He opened the message tube and drew out the letter inside. Another sheet came out with it. Grus unrolled that one first. It was a sketch of a town, as seen from outside. Grus blinked. He'd known Lanius could draw, but he hadn't had any idea the other king was this good.

He started to give his attention to the letter, then looked back at the sketch again. From that sketch, his eyes snapped to the walls of Yozgat. “By the gods!” he muttered. Lanius was not only better than he'd thought, but
much
better than he'd thought. There could be no doubt about it—the other king had produced an outstanding portrait of a city he'd never seen.

Lanius had made mistakes. The texture of the stone didn't quite match that of Yozgat's walls, and the proportions of the towers were subtly off. But it was unmistakably Yozgat.

More than a little reluctantly, Grus rolled up the sketch and broke the seal on the letter. When he finished reading it, he shook his head in reluctant admiration and respect. The letter was as precise as the sketch—and, like it, had a few details that weren't quite the way they were supposed to be.

As with the sketch, those didn't worry Grus. They just reminded him that Lanius was human—for all his cleverness, he didn't see everything there was to see. Noting as much relieved Grus. He decided there might still be some point after all to
his
having a share of the crown.

And, here, he saw very clearly what needed doing. He went over to Pterocles' tent and stuck his head inside. “Oh, good,” he said. “You're here.”

“No, not really,” the wizard answered. “But I do expect to get back pretty soon.”

“Er—right,” Grus said. “You were wondering how we would get the Scepter of Mercy out of Yozgat.”

“Something like that had occurred to me, yes,” Pterocles agreed. “You told me it was none of my business, though.” Resentment stuck up all over him, like spines on a hedgehog.

“Well, it may be after all.” Grus thrust Lanius' letter at him. “Here—read this and tell me what you think.”

Pterocles obeyed. The more he read, the more astonished he looked. When he was finished, he blurted, “That's the craziest thing I ever heard of.”

“Just what I said when King Lanius told me about it last winter,” Grus replied. “Suppose we forget it's crazy, though. Suppose we look at what chance it has of working. More than a little, wouldn't you say? Here, look at this, too.” He showed Pterocles Lanius' sketch of Yozgat.

“Olor's beard!” the wizard exclaimed, recognizing it at once. “That's—amazing, isn't it?”

“Pretty much so,” Grus said. “He's never even gone as far as the Stura, let alone anywhere near here.”

“He's got it down, though. Every place where it matters, he's got it down,” Pterocles said, and Grus nodded. Pterocles asked, “Where do I come into all this?”

“I don't know for certain, but I'll tell you what I had in mind,” Grus said, and he did.

Pterocles stared, then burst out laughing. “Yes, I can do that,” he said, laughing still. “Come to think of it, you don't need me to do that. The clumsiest, most fumble-fingered drunken excuse for a wizard in the world could do that.”

“Well, I don't know the clumsiest, most fumble-fingered drunken excuse for a wizard in the world, and I do know you,” Grus said reasonably. “I still think you'd do a better job than he would, too.”

“For this? You might be surprised,” Pterocles told him.

“Maybe I might be, but I'd better not be, if you know what I mean.” When Grus wanted to, he could sound every inch a king.

Pterocles bowed in acquiescence. “Yes, Your Majesty. Let me know when.”

“I will. Obviously, not yet,” Grus said.

“Yes. Obviously.” Pterocles started a chuckle, but this time didn't quite finish it. His voice was altogether serious as he said, “You know, Your Majesty, I'm a little surprised—maybe more than a little surprised—that letter and that sketch made it down here safely. They had to cross an awful lot of ground the Menteshe can raid before they did.”

“Funny you should say that.” Grus told him the story of the courier's narrow escape from the nomads.

“That's … interesting,” Pterocles said thoughtfully. “And it's even more interesting that the two bands of Menteshe should have squabbled with each other, don't you think?”

“I did, as a matter of fact,” Grus answered. “When I heard that, it made me wonder whether Sanjar's wizards really had worked out a spell to keep the Banished One from taking control of them. That envoy said they were going to try it, but I would be lying if I said I'd believed him.”

“A possibility. Definitely a possibility.”

By the way Pterocles said it, it wasn't a possibility he took seriously. “What were you thinking?” Grus asked him.

“Well, it did occur to me … If the gods in the heavens were going to meddle in the affairs of the material world, that's the way they might go about it. A little bit of confusion at just the right time would go a long way, and who could prove anything afterwards? Not even—him.” The wizard looked south, toward the Argolid Mountains.

So did Grus. Was the Banished One gnashing his teeth down there because his henchmen hadn't caught that courier? It did seem possible. Did it seem likely? Grus pointed at Pterocles. “If—he—can't prove anything, you can't, either.”

“Oh, I know that, Your Majesty,” Pterocles said cheerfully. “But it does give us something to think about, doesn't it?”

Grus' wave encompassed the palisade surrounding Yozgat. “I've already got plenty to think about, thank you very much.” He paused. “It would be nice, though, wouldn't it, to believe the gods in the heavens were paying a little bit of attention—just a little bit, mind you—to what's going on down here?”

“We'll see how things turn out,” Pterocles said. “That may tell us something, one way or the other.”

“Yes, it may,” Grus said. “Question is, will it tell us anything we want to hear?”

“We'll find out,” Pterocles said.

“Very good.” Grus laughed and bowed. “As long as you stick to that, you can prophesy about anything.”

“Being patient is a good start to the secret of all wisdom,” Pterocles said.

“No doubt you're right. It's also one of the hardest things for most people to manage.” Grus shook his head. “No—that's wrong. Most people can't manage it. Take me—I can hardly wait until I get to go on.” He looked down at the sketch Lanius had sent. “I know what I can do in the meantime. I can go around Yozgat until I find the place where this matches up best with what I really see.”

“Good,” Pterocles said. “Then you'll be ready, or as ready as you can be. I didn't know the king—uh, the other king—could draw so well.”

“Neither did I,” Grus admitted. “Lanius … will surprise you every now and then.”

He set out on a circuit of the Avornan lines, carrying the sketch and looking from it to the walls and the city beyond them every fifty paces or so. The other king said in his letter that he'd been as precise as he knew how. Grus believed him. Lanius was precise even when he didn't particularly aim to be. When he did, he was bound to be very precise indeed.

He was bound to be—and he was. Grus looked up from the sketch to the walls after another few steps, then slowly nodded to himself. He rolled up the sketch again. He needed to go no farther. “Here,” he said. “Right here.”

CHAPTER TWENTY-TWO

Lanius paced through the palace in an agony of anxiety. Every time a courier came in, he met the man and snatched the message tube out of his hands. Every time the message turned out to be something ordinary from the provinces, the king snarled in frustration. Lanius was not usually given to snarling. People sent him odd, even frightened, looks.

Rumors didn't take long to start swirling. People talked about him when they didn't think he was listening. Sometimes, though, he was just around a corner in the corridor. Some of the servants thought he and Sosia had had another fight.